A Pro-football Kicker's Perspective

After reading all the for and against comments about the commencement speech given by Harrison Butker, I also felt compelled to comment. But first, and perhaps along a different axis as was displayed by some who commented, I thought it best to read the full text of his speech first. Here is a link if you are also so inclined. 

https://www.ncregister.com/news/harrison-butker-speech-at-benedictine

Anyone who has read my blog knows I have often mentioned that I was raised a Roman Catholic, and that I am now agnostic, at best, even borderline atheistic. 

For those who have may not have a firm grasp on the definition of those two terms,

An agnostic believes that nothing is known or can be known about the existence of God or anything beyond this life but claims neither faith or disbelief in God, while an atheist disbelieves in the existence of God.

For me, someone who often mentions the Creator, I toggle between the two definitions because while I believe there may very well be a force beyond our understanding, I don't believe She picks winners and losers in this life. We have been blessed with all kinds of information, the wonders of nature, a brain to try to solve our shared problems, and even the lessons of some advanced spiritual beings, such as Jesus of Nazareth, Buddha, Mohammed, etc, all which should be enough to help us do for ourselves.  

I certainly don't believe that God favors certain sports teams to win, and generally find it insulting to any belief I might have in an all-powerful, all-knowing entity when I see athletes look to heaven after a home run or touchdown, as if God had a hand in that small, rather insignificant accomplishment. 

That being said, however, I would welcome a scientist who praises the Almighty after discovering a cancer cure, although I would hope that that praise would focus on the suffering saved, not any divine intervention that may have assisted the scientist.

OK, so hopefully, I have created a foundation for the rest of this post.

First and foremost, Harrison Butker has every right to his opinions, and certainly no one should expect anything other than a Catholic religion based commencement speech being delivered at Benedictine College, which is a Catholic liberal arts college. What would you think he would talk about? Further, one would expect his speech to be applauded at such a place; the fact that it was doesn't mean anything more than that those students share some or all of his beliefs.

As I said above, I read the speech in its entirety. And, in conjunction with my recent emphasis on the ability to keep two thoughts in one's head at once, here is my take.

Harrison Butker is proud of his faith, and not shy in advocating for his beliefs. That is a wonderful trait, and to be honest, in a time when people claim certain American or Christian values, it is a good thing when someone calls out what he sees as hypocrisy. However, in his speech, he quickly broaches the subject of Covid, calling it a fiasco, but only in reference to our current president and former NIAI director (Fauci) who called for lock downs, specifically those that effected church attendance and the administration of last rights. 

Strangely, he omitted referring to the previous president, who I assume he endorsed and continues to, even though the lock downs originated during his term, He also failed to mention the one million Americans who died from Covid, instead seeming to focus on the inconvenience that trying to reduce the death toll caused and expressing sympathy for the students in front of him who most likely didn't have a high school graduation. Strange he didn't express sorrow for those who might have lost a loved one during the pandemic.

I guess what I am saying is that he pretty quickly rolled into political commentary which, again, is his right, but with obvious bias. 

I believe that history will be much more kinder to those who may have erred on the side of caution to reduce the death and suffering as opposed to those who were all too willing to sacrifice the old and sick in the name of economics. I say that with confidence as I believe that had children been dying, the reluctance to stem the tide of the spread of the disease through lock downs, social distancing, masks, vaccines, etc, would have been less overt. 

To be fair, Butker did call out clergy of his own faith, but again those criticisms focused on those who did not speak out more vociferously about the policies related to Covid that "interfered" with Catholic tenets, especially as related to not being able to receive the sacraments, a complaint he mentioned more than once.  

Again, to reflect on my life, I received many of the sacraments Butker is referring to, baptism, confirmation, Eucharist, penance and reconciliation to name a few. I wasn't married in a Catholic Church but did have two Methodist ministers at our wedding. Obviously, I have not experienced the sacraments of Anointing of the Sick or Holy Orders (becoming a priest). 

While I understand the importance of these rituals in the Catholic religion, or rituals of any religion, I was also taught that God is in your heart and that if you can't be in church you can take a moment to communicate with God through prayer. I guess I am saying that Butker seems to equate the closing of churches during the pandemic  with an insidious, coordinated effort to undermine religion rather than a scientific approach to stemming a disease that was not well known.

I do agree with Butker that we need to "focus on our own state in life", and that "by living out your vocation," the world may be enlightened by your example. Yet at the same time, he has decided how we should live, advising the students not to get so involved in their achievements and positions (a good point about vanity) but that most of you (speaking to the women, particularly) are probably looking forward to marriage and children.

Certainly, advising women that it is OK to want to be happily married and a good mother is admirable, but he seems to be saying that that is, or should be their ultimate goal, which he further emphasizes by saying that his wife "would be the first to say that her life truly started when she began living her vocation as a wife and mother."  

Now, I don't know his wife, but could easily imagine that she is glad that she is able to stay home and raise her children because her husband makes millions of dollars a year. But to say her life just got started because she was a wife and mother seems pretty arrogant, as if the poor women was lost until she converted to his religion, married him, and had his children. 

I don't know if the Butkers will still be married when the kids leave the nest. I truly hope they live a ripe old age in wedded bliss. But I also would not be surprised if after his football career is over, and the kids are gone, his dear wife pursues a career that generates some income, just in case her use to him has ended. 

Ironically, Butker's own mother is a successful professional women who somehow managed to raise her children and have a successful career. Presenting being a wife and mother as an all or nothing proposition to young women, seems rather insulting to me. 

Butker calls thinking that finding happiness and self worth, for a woman, outside the parameters of marriage and motherhood a "most diabolical lie". Can you say handmaiden's tale?

Later in the speech he denigrates birth control as "playing God with children". The last time I researched child poverty rates in America, especially the southern states where ideologues like Butker control state legislatures, the percentage is disgusting. If family planning is playing God, then the vast majority of today's Catholics are do so, hence the decline in children being born for the last 30 years. The Butker's have two children as of now, I wonder how many they will eventually have, or will Butker and/or his wife choose to play God.

What is truly ironic, is that I do agree that women have been told a diabolical lie. The lie that staying home and raising children is valued in America. The statistics that confirm it are all too real.

Divorce rates among couples whose children have grown, have climbed precipitously. Often because the man, especially men with money, move on to a younger model. The fact that Butker will most likely vote for the republican candidate for president who has done that twice in his life, belies his admiration for women. 

Also, the poverty rate among older women is higher than for older men. The fact that social security benefits are tied to work outside the home accounts for much of this problem. I didn't see in Butker's speech a call for basic income payments for women who choose to stay home, or even social security credit for this time. He wants them to have babies, and be financially dependent on their husbands. After that, I guess is their problem.

Butker doesn't mention to those young ladies who are just about to embark on their futures, that if they choose to stay at home and be dutiful wives and wonderful mothers (which is admirable as I have acknowledged), they better make sure their husband has life insurance in case of an accident, or they have a strong prenup in case he moves on to a newer model once the kids are gone, or a line on another man to take care of them, since they might have a dearth of marketable skills once their womb is ineffective.

To be fair, Butker does implore the young men in the audience to be present in the home, take part in raising the children, perhaps even engage in work that is difficult but supports the family better than something that is easy. He equates a rise in violence to the lack of male presence in the family, which most likely does have a correlation, but glosses over the fact that the majority of the countries he is compares America to have much lower gun ownership rates. It is easy enough to google crime statistics to see that over half of female murder victims are killed by someone known to the victim. 

Finally, Butker makes a plea that the students date and befriend people who will help them in their life towards salvation. Now, as a parent, we certainly want our children to marry someone who will be a positive influence, who balance their life, who make them better people. But don't we also want our kids, all our young people, to learn tolerance of those who are different, who worship differently, who love differently, who believe in a different god, or none at all. 

That is my biggest problem with Catholicism, and really pretty much all religions. This belief that there is a one true religion, and their version is the one. 

Butker decries diversity pretty early in his speech, yet, as I have said many times, it was the Creator that made us different. Perhaps that is the true path to heaven, not which religion you follow but how you treat people not like yourself.

If so, Butker may be in for a surprise when he stands in front of the pearly gates.

 

 

MAGA and The Wide Awakes

An extremely interesting article in the April-May edition of the Smithsonian. And, as is so often the case, information about American history with which I was not familiar.

As presented in the article, during the presidential campaign of 1860, a political organization arose in Connecticut that was to help elect Abraham Lincoln as well as lead to the outbreak of the Civil War. A group called the Wide Awakes.

Here is a link to that article which I highly recommend you read, if the link works when you encounter this post.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/club-cape-wearing-activists-helped-elect-lincoln-spark-civil-war-180984000/ 

Should the link not work, in summary, the Wide Awakes movement began inauspiciously in February of 1860 when Edgar S. Yergason ducked into the textile shop where he worked, and quickly fashioned a cape and hat from waterproofed black cambric, while brandishing a torch he had "borrowed" from someone who was marching in the parade following a recent political speech. Along with a few of his fellow clerks who donned a similar outfit, the young men stood out from the large crowd which had gathered to hear that evening's speech.

From there, the young men began meeting, their group grew in size, they fine tuned their costume, and named themselves the Wide Awakes, a popular expression of the time which was used by people who were standing up for themselves. 

The politics of 1860 were much different than today's, in that the Republicans of the time, especially those living in the northern sates, were anti-slavery, while it was the Democratic party, particularly the southern democrats, who were using their economic and political power to protect slaver's rights. It was a not unfamiliar case where the minority held more sway than the majority. 

It was also the case that the presidential election of 1860 was a four way contest, with two prominent democrats, one from the south, one from the north, vying for the office, plus a ticket comprising the Whig and Know Nothing parties in addition to Lincoln's Republican party.

If you want to read a quick summary of the election, here is a Wikipedia link.  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1860_United_States_presidential_election 

To finish this history lesson, Lincoln won the election with just under 40% on the vote, hardly a mandate but victory nonetheless as he garnered 172 electoral votes to 123 for the other 3 tickets combined. This was due in no small part to the formation of Wide Awakes chapters all across the northern states which endorsed Lincoln while believing that slavery was an evil that must be eliminated. 

While it is true that Lincoln did not run as a strict abolitionist, once his presidential victory was confirmed, the southern states began to secede, and Lincoln was now faced with a shattering Union. 

Which brings me to the current political movement called MAGA, which stands for Make America Great Again, and which has taken over the Republican party. 

In some ways, the impetus for the Wide Awakes and MAGA, is similar in that there was a real belief by the everyday people of 1860 that a minority of people were controlling the economy and politics of the nation, and that the silent majority were suffering for this situation. 

There is certainly evidence that a similar demographic voted for Trump in 2016, a demographic that felt that its needs were not being met by the Washington DC establishment.

In a way, that is the definition of a popular movement.

In 1860, the powers that be were rich, profitable and powerful because they had slave labor to draw upon to do the hard work of farming without the accompanying costs. In turn, their money bought politicians who were either uncaring about enslaving African Americans, after all, many of our founding fathers owned slaves, or were accepting of the necessary evil of slavery to drive America's economy, or preferred not to have to make the difficult decisions related to how to winnow America from its slavery addiction. 

While it all seems so obvious today, in 1860 it was far from clear cut. 

Sadly, as a result of Lincoln's election, hundreds of thousands of Americans were killed at the hands of fellow citizens, cities and towns were destroyed, and our economy suffered tremendously. 

In the case of the MAGA movement, there is certainly a justification for putting America first. For making political decisions that improve the lives of everyday Americans before worrying about the lives of those who live south of the border or across the ocean. It is an attractive slogan, not unlike the idea of being "wide awake" to the evils of slavery, and the power of slavers to control our government.

If we assume that the Wide Awakes were driven, even if only in part, by the belief that slavery was evil, then their movement, while perhaps a bit reflective of putting America's interest first, did so by deciding that treating an entire race of people as inferior was wrong. 

To me, it is the ultimate expression of selfishness to consider a man your slave, and so, while the Wide Awakes may have been selfish in their desire to be heard by those who refused to hear, to take power from those who hoarded power for its own sake, it was far from selfish to include the prospect of freeing the enslaved.

I have written a number of posts about the growing selfishness that seems to be permeating our society. How the MAGA movement, while holding the laudable proposition that we should act to make our country great again, are focused more on who shouldn't be included in this improvement, whether those people be immigrants seeking a better life, or Americans who wish to exercise their freedom to make decisions about their own body, or when to become parents, or how to vote, or who to love, or which gender makes them more comfortable.

Finally, the Wide Awakes movement was about the future, and about rejecting a past where keeping people as slave was accepted while much of the MAGA movement is about going backward, treating women as baby factories, immigrants as vermin, and anyone with a different idea of finding love and happiness, or even one's true self, as not worthy of American freedom.

The pessimist in me believes that, like the destruction that accompanied the Civil War in the years following Lincoln's election, and in the decades which followed during the Reconstruction years when African Americans were still legally treated as second class citizens despite the lofty goals of the Wide Awakes movement, we are living in a similar time. 

Similar, not because there are thousands of Americans being killed by other Americans, but because the animosity which could lead to such a possibility is all around us.

Fortunately, as I have detailed in my previous post about having two thought in one head, the optimist in me thinks that we will survive this phase. That we will become Wide Awakes in realizing that we can do both. 

That we can keep America great while sharing this greatness with people born on the wrong side of our southern border, or whose country borders Russia, or who live, love and perceive themselves in a different way than we perceive ourselves.

Idiot Wind

I read a short article concerning a comment made by the republican presidential candidate at a rally this past weekend. The comment that was quoted concerned the increase of Chinese illegal immigrants being encountered at the border. 

Since the demographics of those particular immigrants are mostly men in their twenties and thirties, the obvious conclusion must be that they are here to form an army to wage war against America, so said the candidate.

Notwithstanding the obvious fact that men of that age group are also more likely to be seeking work, being such an able bodied demographic, and that there is absolutely no evidence of such a conspiracy, one would think that such an observation would be greeted with a shake of the head.

One could say that, at best, it is just political rhetoric, although, at worst, one could say that it reflects the inherent racism that permeates that particular candidate.

For the last few years, my daughter and daughter-in-law have been hosting a mother-daughter Mother's Day weekend. Since we have only one car now, I drove my wife to the Harrisburg area where we met the other mom who drove the two of them to the celebration. 

It was on the way to pick up Nora on the return from the weekend that I played the Bob Dylan CD "Blood on the Tracks", which is one of my favorites.

I hadn't heard the album in a while, and while I remembered most of the songs, including the iconic "Tangled Up In Blue", I had forgotten about the song called "Idiot Wind".

Here are the lyrics

-------

Someone's got it in for me
They're planting stories in the press
Whoever it is I wish they'd cut it out quick
But when they will I can only guess
They say I shot a man named Gray
And took his wife to Italy
She inherited a million bucks
And when she died it came to me
I can't help it if I'm lucky

People see me all the time
And they just can't remember how to act
Their minds are filled with big ideas
Images and distorted facts
Even you, yesterday
You had to ask me where it was at
I couldn't believe after all these years
You didn't know me better than that
Sweet lady

Idiot wind
Blowing every time you move your mouth
Blowing down the back roads headin' south
Idiot wind
Blowing every time you move your teeth
You're an idiot, babe
It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe

I ran into the fortune-teller
Who said, "beware of lightning that might strike"
I haven't known peace and quiet
For so long I can't remember what it's like
There's a lone soldier on the cross
Smoke pourin' out of a boxcar door
You didn't know it, you didn't think it could be done
In the final end he won the wars
After losin' every battle

I woke up on the roadside
Daydreamin' 'bout the way things sometimes are
Visions of your chestnut mare
Shoot through my head and are makin' me see stars
You hurt the ones that I love best
And cover up the truth with lies
One day you'll be in the ditch
Flies buzzin' around your eyes
Blood on your saddle

Idiot wind
Blowing through the flowers on your tomb
Blowing through the curtains in your room
Idiot wind
Blowing every time you move your teeth
You're an idiot, babe
It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe

It was gravity which pulled us down
And destiny which broke us apart
You tamed the lion in my cage
But it just wasn't enough to change my heart
Now everything's a little upside down
As a matter of fact the wheels have stopped
What's good is bad, what's bad is good
You'll find out when you reach the top
You're on the bottom

I noticed at the ceremony
Your corrupt ways had finally made you blind
I can't remember your face anymore
Your mouth has changed
Your eyes don't look into mine
The priest wore black on the seventh day
And sat stone-faced while the building burned
I waited for you on the running boards
Near the cypress trees, while the springtime turned
Slowly into autumn

Idiot wind
Blowing like a circle around my skull
From the Grand Coulee Dam to the Capitol
Idiot wind
Blowing every time you move your teeth
You're an idiot, babe
It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe

I can't feel you anymore
I can't even touch the books you've read
Every time I crawl past your door
I been wishin' I was somebody else instead
Down the highway, down the tracks
Down the road to ecstasy
I followed you beneath the stars
Hounded by your memory
And all your ragin' glory

I been double-crossed now
For the very last time and now I'm finally free
I kissed goodbye the howling beast
On the borderline which separated you from me
You'll never know the hurt I suffered
Nor the pain I rise above
And I'll never know the same about you
Your holiness or your kind of love
And it makes me feel so sorry

Idiot wind
Blowing through the buttons of our coats
Blowing through the letters that we wrote
Idiot wind
Blowing through the dust upon our shelves
We're idiots, babe

It's a wonder we can even feed ourselves  

-----

Obviously, there is a lot to unpack in that song. And, of course, Bob Dylan was not referring to Donald Trump when he wrote it in 1974. When I researched the meaning according to Dylan, I found numerous comments and interpretations, but most center around the hurt and betrayal that occur when a relationship ends, and the words of one's ex-lover which blow forth "every time you move your mouth", every time you move your teeth". 

Still, as I cruised along the turnpike, I immediately thought of the ex-president's comment while the song played. It not just that he routinely makes extraordinarily virulent comments about the topics of the day, but that his words are accepted, even welcomed, by a swath of our electorate who are all too willing to bask in the hatred that prejudice creates, all in the name of making America great. 

The actual fact, that it is immigrants that made America great, seems lost on far too many people, many whom are only first and second generation Americans themselves. It general, it was immigrants who built our skyscrapers, highway system, and power generation network, and specifically, was Chinese immigrants who were instrumental in laying the tracks for our intercontinental railway system. 

Idiot Wind. 

At this point, I imagine that for the foreseeable future, I will think of this description every time I see Trump speaking. His remarks seem so preposterous, his words just so much wind whistling through his teeth. 

Yet it is just not him, as his words find willing receptacles in the ears of many Americans. 

Someone's got it in for me, they're planting stories in the press, or fake news, as Trump likes to say.

What's good is bad, what's bad is good, you'll find out when you reach the top, you're on the bottom, which is the calling card of an agent of chaos.

Blowing like a circle around my skull, from the Grand Coulee Dam to the Capitol, which oozes even more meaning in light of January 6th.    

Whether time will pass and Trump's idiot wind will be mentioned with Joe McCarthy, is far from certain. But perhaps we can hope that in the not so distant future, those he has duped will echo the lines:

I been double-crossed now
For the very last time and now I'm finally free

-----

I referred to a Bob Dylan song once before, in a post from 2015. Here is a link to that post.

https://wurdsfromtheburbs.blogspot.com/2015/12/god-on-our-side.html

National Parks, Conservation and Exploitation

When I first log in to this blog, I generally review the posts that have been accessed in the past seven days, just to give me a glimpse of which of my thoughts have been recently read. Usually the most hits are for those I have recently posted, or referenced in those recent posts. 

But sometimes a post appears that I haven't thought about recently, or, frankly, do not remember writing. Considering that I am approaching 600 posts since I began this blog in 2010, I interpret that admission, not as a reflection of my advancing age and slightly diminishing memory, but as an acknowledgement of just how many different topics I have touched upon. A point of pride, if you will.

Anyway, the more interesting aspect of this concept is that I was intending to post about the book I just finished, a book called "Leave No Footprints" by Conor Knighton, to which I referenced in my last post. What is interesting is that as I was thinking about this post and the book, I planned on commenting at some point about how Americans value our wonderful national park system, and about how all Americans seem to share that admiration, regardless of political affiliation.   

And then I saw that the following post was read by someone, somewhere.

https://wurdsfromtheburbs.blogspot.com/2014/09/conservatives-and-conservationists.html

Now, to be clear, I know many people who vote Republican, many people who who label themselves conservative (as opposed to liberal), who have traveled extensively throughout America to our various national parks, state parks, or other such "protected" areas. They are just as amazed and humbled by the magnificent natural wonders that are on display at these places as I have been, and are just as adamant that they should be maintained so that future generations can enjoy them as much as they have, and will continue to do.

If you were to read Knighton's book, you will gain an even more profound appreciation for these places, as he has masterfully related, not just his personal experience of visiting all of our national parks in one calendar year, but the history behind some of those parks, how they were "discovered", who advocated for them, and how they are maintained. 

And how fragile they are in terms of the struggle for funding, and their vulnerability to the existential threat posed by climate change.

This past week, there was a story circulating in the news about a meeting between the Republican Presidential candidate and the various CEO's of the fossil fuel industry. It was reported that a request was made by the candidate for $1 billion in support for his candidacy in exchange for expanding their ability to drill in federally owned lands, reversing the current push for electric vehicles, and eliminating various environmental standards which make it harder for the fossil fuel industry to extract oil and gas.

Now, while I am sure that no one present at that meeting was advocating for drilling in Yosemite or Yellowstone, there was certainly the option of opening up more extraction projects in other federal land that is less protected from exploitation. 

While the thought itself is abhorrent to conservationists, it is just another transactional approach by the ultimate transactional politician whose only yardstick is what can do the most for him. 

This is the essence of what bothers me the most about my friends and family who vote Republican yet wax poetic about their visits to our national parks or other such natural wonders. They are sincere in relating the wonderful experiences they have had, are awed by the extent of how blessed we are to live in a country with so many wondrous outdoor places to see, yet continue to vote for people who have very little concern about conserving those very same places. 

There is a chapter in Knighton's book called God (other chapters are labelled such things as Water, Sound, Mountains, Food) in which the author connects the beauty of a few of the national parks with the awesome power of creation, and the ability of being in nature to connect one to the force which created everything. 

The best way to explain it is by comparing the power and humility and respect that some people feel towards their god while in church. For the author, who admits to not being a very religious person, being in nature provides that same feeling for him, and for many people whom he refers to in the book, people like John Muir and Teddy Roosevelt, among many, many others, who also experienced such awe and worship for nature but then went the next step and helped preserve those places that inspired them.

While most of us may never achieve the distinction of being responsible for helping to create a national park, we can all do our part by voting for people who hold a similar respect for nature. 

One of the major issues facing our country is the all-or-nothing approach we see exhibited in discussions of our problems. The my-way-or-the-highway approach that eschews compromise or finding common ground. 

For a country that claims to be the greatest in history, the ability to provide the necessary energy to maintain our standard of living while also protecting our natural wonders from exploitation should be possible. It is not a zero sum game. We can do both, but first we have to acknowledge that both can be possible. 

When it was determined that burning coal was spewing all kinds of contaminants into the air, scrubbers were required to reduce such pollution. And, while it was true that these scrubbers cost money, and that some of those costs were passed down to the consumers, well, what price should we place on clear air? 

Frankly, considering that the fossil fuel industry makes billions in profits while also receiving subsidies from our tax money, I would prefer that those companies be required to absorb the costs of their degradation of our environment, as the cost of doing business, but I am willing to compromise that each of us, producers as well as consumers, should shoulder some cost so as to keep our air breathable. 

A similar argument can be made for those businesses who pollute our water. 

Again, isn't worth a few extra dollars a month to know that your children can go outside without a mask? Or can drink out of the tap in the kitchen without worrying about lead or arsenic in the water?

In a recent post called One Head, Two Thoughts, I commented on the seeming lack of ability for Americans to have two contradictory thoughts in our heads at once. In the post I was referring to the ability to condemn both the October 7th Hamas atrocity and the current slaughter of Palestinian women and children. Condemning both does not reveal anything more insidious than the fact that one believes that murdering people is not a good thing.

I have my own personal problem with balancing two particular thoughts in my head at once, those thoughts being that I feel we have already passed the tipping point on the eventual demise of our democracy, and our environment, and the belief in humanity's ability to rouse itself from its complacency and address our common problems as a unified world.

I hold both of these thoughts at once, express each over the other at certain times through my social commentaries and stories. 

Sometimes I am happy that I have less time alive in front of me than behind, so I don't see the ramifications of our shortsightedness, and the suffering that our choices will create. 

At other times, I regret that I won't be around when the next greatest generation figures it all out as I detailed in the following story.

https://wurdsfromtheburbs.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-next-greatest-generation.html

Regardless of how it all turns out, in the short run I recommend reading "Leave Only Footprints", or better yet, read it as you embark on your own tour of our national parks.